Does your money belong to you?

[Costa]

Recently came across this article,  http://www.professorhollybell.com/2012/12/03/you-cant-keep-your-money-because-it-belongs-to-the-government/

 

The argument is that, money doesn't actually belong to the taxpayers, which means the government is not actually stealing it since it already belongs to the government. 

 

Is this true? 

 

[DCLugi]

Isn't any form of currency just a representation of a person's energy and time? The actual paper and ink aren't of much value.

[Alan C.]

The paper currency that is in circulation isn't real money; that's why it's called fiat currency.

 

Real money arises on the market. Paper tickets issued by the State aren't money.

[utopian]

It is true, the money does not belong to the tax payers. It is a private money supply that we are just using.

 

Now, in order to use this money supply, our government, supposedly representing us, their people,

 

agreed to BORROW this money. Lets say, for the sake of simplicity, they only agreed to borrow 100 dollars.

 

The private entity agreed to lend us their money supply, but... make sure you are paying attention... AT INTEREST.

 

So if we have that 100 dollars for one month, and the interest is 10% a month, after one month, we owe the entity 100 dollars, plus 10 dollars.

 

Here is the problem; that last 10 dollars was never created/loaned to us, so we can never actually pay off the debt. 

 

Do you see the mechanic now? It is actually a complex form of slavery. No one could ever actually pay off the debt.

 

And not only that, but the problem is a lot worse than 100 dollars. For America, its over 17 TRILLION dollars, and possibly 17 trillion, TIMES 9.

[J. D. Stembal]

Total American Debt is actually much higher. You are only considering the National Debt in that figure.

 

America is 61.6 Trillion Dollars in debt... http://www.usdebtclock.org/

 

On the bright side, we are paying down our credit cards.

 

You are describing the Mandrake Mechanism of fractional reserve banking. Mike Maloney does a decent job of explaining how it works at the Federal level is this video.

 

[Mister Mister]

The main reason that people use FRN's in the US, or whatever other national currency rather than something else, is that the Income Tax must be declared in these notes.  This is why the Income Tax and Central Bank tend to be implemented at the same time, you can't really have one without the other.  This is a very old practice, governments have used taxes as a way to implement fiat currency going back thousands of years.  But the claim on your labor is still immoral.

[utopian]

I take it you have also read "The Creature" J.D.? I have seen the debt clock before, though I think last time I saw it, it was 17 trillion. Oh how time flies. 

 

What attributes to that 61 trillion figure, besides national debt? Private debt?

[Pepin]

As I have been watching the debates over the debt ceiling, the fiscal cliff, and taxation I am reminded of one assumption about money the government makes (often unconsciously) that those of us who think we should be allowed to keep the money we have earned often forget: It’s not your money, it belongs to the government. The government prints it, backs it by their “full faith and credit”, and decides how much will be circulating in the economy at any given time.

 

The government has granted a monopoly to the Federal Reserve, a private bank, to regulate the money supply. In effect, the Fed can be considered to be another government agency, but on a technical level it isn't.

 

Ignoring that and moving onto the central idea, the argument is as follows:

 

Group X produces A

A is owned by group X

You use A

You are using X's property, which they have full right to take back in full

 

The argument could work except that A, in this case money, is actually being sold. This is a central function of the monetary system, that debt is being sold and traded, whether it is in the form of treasuries or dollar bills. To make this extremely clear why this argument does not work:

 

You buy a treasury from the US Federal Government

After it matures you cash it in for Federal Reserve notes

The US Federal Government can take back its Federal Reserve notes because they own them

 

Whether you are a US citizen or not does not matter because the return on US government debt has been Federal Reserve notes since the US has been of the gold standard. If the problem with that doesn't quite make sense, let me make it a little more clear.

 

Company X produces A

Company X sells A

A is owned by the buyer.

 

Likewise, when the government produces debt based notes, they are transferring ownership of those notes to the buyer. The government does not own the notes once they are sold, that wouldn't make sense. When an investor buys a treasury, they are relying primarily on the productivity of the US taxpayer to secure the investment. They are buying debt from the US government. When the investor cashes in their treasury, they are receiving dollars, dollars that the US government does not own.

 

I feel like I am being repetitive, it is just that this argument doesn't really make sense. Why would anyone invest into anything if they wouldn't own the return. Imagine you invest $10,000 into coke, after 10 years you cash in your stock, and you receive $13,000 that coke can take back at anytime. Would anybody take an investment where you did not own the return?

 

Yes, I get that US citizens are financing these returns through their labor and taxes, I get that US citizens are on the hook for an estimated 200 trillion dollars in unfunded liabilities, but this does not mean that the government has the right to tax because it owns federal reserve notes. So what, the government is going to take all of the Federal Reserve notes from everyone who has ever received a return on a government treasury and bond including the people who have traded it and they are going to take those Federal Reserve notes who are trading in their treasuries and bonds.

 

Ok, I am ranting now, but to clarify again... When debtors cash in their certificates of debt, you are going to confiscate the returns given to previous debtors.

[Anuojat]

If the state makes use of another legal tender illegal and heavily discourages emplyoers from using anything esle and manipulates everything to use it... then id say this is forced association with fiat currency and the state.

 

Also government doesnt exist. People in government do, so to say these randomly secretly selected induviduals "own"anything is dubious at best dishonest most likely.

[J. D. Stembal]

I take it you have also read "The Creature" J.D.? I have seen the debt clock before, though I think last time I saw it, it was 17 trillion. Oh how time flies. 

 

What attributes to that 61 trillion figure, besides national debt? Private debt?

 

Aye, I have read the G. Edward Griffin book. It's a great read. It doesn't feel as long as it is. It's too bad the hardcover costs so much. I had to request it on inter-library loan, so I could have something solid in my hands.

 

The 61.6 trillion figure combines all American debt, household, business, state, federal, local, and financial, as the tool-tip at the top of the page explains. The national debt is 18.2 trillion, higher than the GDP. However, neither figure includes all the unfunded liabilities such as Social Security, Medicare, and government/municipal pensions. Those are listed at the very bottom, which amount to 96.1 trillion.

 

If you include total US debt and liabilities, the average American citizen born today is on the hook for repaying at least $1 million dollars during their lifetime, in other words, a very high improbability.

 

Something has to give!

 

This is a critical part of the reason why many 24-38 year old people are not having children. How can you provide full-time parental care and homeschooling when families are under the simultaneous yoke of debt and tax burdens? You want to be very well squared away financially to raise children responsibly and peacefully.

[Anotherrandomperson]

It is true, the money does not belong to the tax payers. It is a private money supply that we are just using.

 

Now, in order to use this money supply, our government, supposedly representing us, their people,

 

agreed to BORROW this money. Lets say, for the sake of simplicity, they only agreed to borrow 100 dollars.

 

The private entity agreed to lend us their money supply, but... make sure you are paying attention... AT INTEREST.

 

So if we have that 100 dollars for one month, and the interest is 10% a month, after one month, we owe the entity 100 dollars, plus 10 dollars.

 

Here is the problem; that last 10 dollars was never created/loaned to us, so we can never actually pay off the debt. 

 

Do you see the mechanic now? It is actually a complex form of slavery. No one could ever actually pay off the debt.

 

And not only that, but the problem is a lot worse than 100 dollars. For America, its over 17 TRILLION dollars, and possibly 17 trillion, TIMES 9.

I've heard it speculated that the debt is never meant to be repayed; the whole global financial system has been fixed. 

[Matthew Ed Moran]

This is retarded. Her premises do not lead to her conclusion.

 

Premises: 

 

The government produces the money

 

The government backs the money by their “full faith and credit”

 

The government decides how much money will be circulating in the economy at any given time.

 

Therefore, all circulating money printed by the government belongs to the government.

 

So by this logic:

 

Apple produces ipods.

 

Apple backs ipods with their "full faith and credit"

 

Apple decides how many ipods will be circulating the economy at any given time

 

Therefore, if you have an Apple ipod, and you think you have earned it, you are wrong. It belongs to Apple, and the amount of ipods Apple lets people keep is simply contingent upon how generous Apple wants to be.

 

Money enters the economy as a result of "open market" interactions. The Fed essentially sells the money into private hands. This means the ownership of the commodity transfers (and of course it is only a commodity because of coercive central planning in the first place). And when the money leaves the hands of the banksters in the form of loans, then ownership has transferred once again. Just like if I sell an ipod I bought to someone else, it is now their ipod (even though neither I nor the person I sold the ipod produced it).

 

I wonder if I am missing something, or if this lady is really just drowning in a sea of kool-aid (Stockholm syndrome flavor). I guess both could be true, but please let me know if my analysis is wrong!

[shirgall]

In the US the intrinsic value of money is that it is the only media allowed for paying your taxes. Any other value ascribed to it is ephemeral. That it is required for almost any transaction since almost all transactions are taxed gives it some staying power.

 

Since that money represents the protection money you have to pay to live and breathe that's about as personal as property gets.

[AncapFTW]

Also government doesnt exist. People in government do, so to say these randomly secretly selected induviduals "own"anything is dubious at best dishonest most likely.

This argument doesn't make sense.  You are essentially saying "the forest doesn't exist, only trees.", "Companies don't exist, only employees and owners", "Objects don't exist, only atoms."

 

The government is defined as a group of individuals which get to make the rules and enforce their rules on a specific area or on a specific group of people through violence.  It makes as much sense to say "the government doesn't own anything" as saying "Microsoft doesn't own anything."  The fact that they got all of their stuff via violence doesn't change that fact.  Neither does the fact that their member get changed periodically.

[Anuojat]

This argument doesn't make sense.  You are essentially saying "the forest doesn't exist, only trees.", "Companies don't exist, only employees and owners", "Objects don't exist, only atoms."

 

The government is defined as a group of individuals which get to make the rules and enforce their rules on a specific area or on a specific group of people through violence.  It makes as much sense to say "the government doesn't own anything" as saying "Microsoft doesn't own anything."  The fact that they got all of their stuff via violence doesn't change that fact.  Neither does the fact that their member get changed periodically.

 

I think it is the case though ,mainly because government is a concept and concept do not exist as physical enteties. Government does exists as a concept that can be understood (aka comprehensiveable description of certain point/s in reality.) Now the people government is composed of cannto "own"the money because for group to collectively own anyhting someone had to first induvidually own the money. One has to give unowned objects value to attain prperty (and transform it too) and the people in the government certainly did NOT do this with FED in 1917. And the fact that the ownership chances secretly and affects ALL people in arbitary geological are whther they were involved with it or not.

 

I compare it with an analogy:

 

"People are forced to swim in a lake which is "owned" by the people doing said enforcement. They own it by the means of stealing money from said forced swimmers great great grand parents all the while asking the people forced to swim in the lake who should continue th ownership of the lake."

 

One cannot own anything trough violence, only posses just like a thief. If i steal your car and then force you to drive around with it and use it and DARE claim ownership i would

be 100% wrong.